


Look Up

by Darkarashi



Category: Destiny (Video Games)
Genre: Cunnilingus, F/M, Hero Worship, Oral Sex, Sloppy Makeouts, Slow Burn, Stuttering, The Dawning (Destiny)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-16
Updated: 2020-08-16
Packaged: 2021-03-05 19:55:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,997
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25930954
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Darkarashi/pseuds/Darkarashi
Summary: Saint-14, the Greatest Titan Who Ever Was, admires the Young Wolf. She is his own Guardian, the one who came for him when all else seemed lost. She was the point by which he set his compass. She had done the impossible, so would he do as well, to one day be worthy of of her.Vez, the Young Wolf, admires the work of many around her, but Saint-14's saving was one of the proudest moments she has had in long memory. Nothing was lost, no great battle scarred the world. This was not the Red War, or losing Cayde-6. This was, by all accounts, a victory through and through. The Infinite Forest was made to bend to her and - and that was good.But hero worship is something that has always sat wrong with her, and Saint-14's exuberant adoration is...something new to her.
Relationships: Female Guardian/Saint-14 (Destiny), Guardian/Saint-14 (Destiny)
Comments: 22
Kudos: 67





	Look Up

The path up to his destination was…unexpectedly well travelled, he mused as he walked.

Saint-14’s hands tightened on his shotgun.

In such a short amount of time, in such a _long_ amount of time, he had come to understand so much more of this gun, and the woman who had brought it to him. The world he stepped into now was unfamiliar as it was familiar. Things had changed, things had not changed. He’d been gone for so long that the internal processors that clocked the passage of time for him had all but given up on updating him. Time in the Forest was meaningless, but still.

Things had changed.

This path being well traveled did not necessarily mean there would be trouble but…he had learned to be prepared. The Last City twinkled below him as he climbed, searching out his old place of respite. Within leaping distance, within distance for him to provide aid, to be a wall, to Guard, but still…far enough away for the sounds of nature to be louder than the sounds of the City.

Still, there were footsteps in the snow leading up to his old place. He knew better than to hope that the pigeons that used to roost here would still be here, but perhaps their grand children would be around. He had birdseed with him, always. Louis liked him, but he preferred the pigeons.

It was Dawning after all. How fortuitous for him to come back when such a celebration was on, when he could really see and _believe_ that the City was alive, that everyone was still giving and happy and loving as they had been in his time. Recovery from the Red War had been slow. The Dawning was a time to celebrate and rebuild the bonds that had been broken.

The footsteps were fresh, though, and drawing up at what used to be the opening to the cave he’d visit, he had to take a moment, considering carefully.

There was a door, where there previously had been none, carefully fitted into the stone, so as to be seamless. It was, rather obviously a door, not a collapsed or false wall, fitted with a blast-resistant window, heavy and clearly made to withstand an onslaught. Looking at it more carefully, Saint-14 couldn’t help but be impressed. The angle of it, the way the door opened, it clearly was built in with the intent of being a chokepoint. Something a single Guardian could stand and hold.

The presence of it gave him pause, and he lifted a hand, prepared to knock, just in case. Perhaps the pigeons were still on their little cave ledge, certainly whoever was here would understand. He wasn’t above leaning on the fact that he was Saint-14, and he wanted to see the birds again, were they there. He stowed his shotgun, within easy grasp, as always, but a headbutt could solve many problems if he was truly caught unaware.

A breeze swept up the mountain, and the door swung open.

To a home.

Inside, it was warmly lit, a hand-woven rug decorating the floor on other side of the lintel, a pair of boots, muddy and scuffed from slap rifle fire tucked neatly, toe-first into a little cubby just to the side.

He recognized the helm hanging to the side of the door and it made his chest ache. The long curling horns flared out to the side, something Most Hated but…so familiar and loved by him, specifically, that still hummed with a Void-Light intimately familiar to him. He had seen that helm, and the Warlock who had worn it, charging in behind him, her Ghost’s voice on the comms telling _him_ she was coming to save him, to get him out of there as House Rain swarmed the area. That memory had kept him moving through decades of battling the Vex, her flinchless fear before the odds, her careful words, her gentle, but firm power. Her utterly indomitable will. The way she’d come when his Light was moments from being stripped, firm and resolute on the comms again, huffing laughter at his exuberant encouragement, accepting his help with a gentle nod of her head.

 _Her_.

Her robes were hung next to it, singed with radiolaria, and a thoughtfully placed bucket underneath it catching the remnants that still dripped slowly from the hem.

He peeked further inside, his voicebox locked up

It was the same cave, he knew the shape and form of it so, so well. A small, natural formation that punched through this thinner part of the mountain, an entrance here, and a small opening out against the sheer face of the cliff on the other side that he used to sit and feed pigeons at, now carefully decorated. Shelves had been carved into the stone, and by the rough look of it, it had been all by hand. More of the same hand-woven pieces of cloth decorated the area, some showing small signs of the starting of embroidery on them. The design was neat, angular, but clearly new to the hand of whoever had made it.

Saint-14 knew he should probably call out, and not intrude, if this really was her place, it would be –

* * *

“You know, he idolizes you,” Zavala had said, so full of pride, so happy, so joyful that _The Saint-14_ was back in the Tower and she had never been more happy that she always kept her helm on.

She’d learned, so, so far back in her time here that she needed to do just that or people would see her reactions to things. It was easier to just hold her shoulders square and keep her posture straight if she could make any face she wanted behind the full-plate covering of her helm.

So Zavala did not see the instinctive flinch at the thought that crossed her face.

Or the way she felt the weight of those words settle on her shoulder with everything else.

And because she rarely spoke to anyone, she did not have to worry about the choking cloud of aborted syllables rising in the back of her throat.

The Young Wolf, they called her, deferent, reverent. Zavala trusted her, he said, relied on her, looked to her when the impossible needed doing, and it was not trust misplaced. She _had_ done the Impossible, she kept doing it, because every time there was even the chance she could fail, the stakes were simply too high for her to let herself. Oryx, Crota, The Undying Mind, The SIVA Crisis, the Red War, Skolas, Ghaul, Calus, on and on and _on and on and on_. God-killer. Slayer of Immortals. But, god, Saint-14 was the Greatest Titan. He’d always been…more than her.

Sure, Saint had crowed her victories as she had defeated the Martyr Mind, as she had worked around, kiting the Vex through the area, and he had bolstered her when she had been flagging, urging her on, telling her she was doing well, that he was impressed. She had thought it was just the emotive high of being trapped and then finding freedom, she’d laughed, quietly in the cacophony of battle at how effusive he was being. But…

She had handled her work that remained in the Tower, and then walked out to her apartment, battling the rising tide of anxiety in her gut as Zavala’s words rattled around in her head. The concern from Ikora about making a habit of this, when she knew that Ikora would have wanted her to bring Cayde back instead of Saint-14, but it wasn’t like she _had_ a choice, it was just – it was –

“Hey, hey, Vez, hey, calm down, we’re almost there,” her Ghost said her hands started to shake. “I know, it’s a lot, but we’re almost home, it’ll be okay. It’s going to be okay, we’ll talk about it and you can unwind. It’s okay.”

She just nodded, moving quickly to get home, to her place outside of the City, away from everyone, so she could be on her own for a bit and think. Just decompress. Away from everyone who looked at her like she was some sort of hero. Like she was _someone_.

Home was a cave, near enough to the City that no one questioned whether or not she was in there, and definitely wasn’t the Apartment within the City with her name on it. Glimmer was not something she worried about now, wasn’t something she had concerned herself with long before the Red War, and afterwards, after everything she had done, it was easy to find a place that would let her stay there.

But outside the City, in her own place, surrounded by things she made with her hands, things she _made_ , not killed, not destroyed, that was her place. An old cave, showing some signs of activity but from so, so long ago, she let herself relax. No armor. No weapons. Just her own comfortable clothes, made by her own hand, with her glimmer going to the sorts of things that ended up with her learning how to weave and sew and then letting herself make it for herself. Hers. Her own. Just for her, by her.

“Loxling, c-can you r-ruh-run through the l-list of missions pending, please?” Vez called over her shoulder, not looking up from her desk.

She’d set it up so it looked out through the wide natural window. She’d filled it in with blast-glass, not wanting to get found and attacked by Eliksni or Red Legion in the area that may not flinch at the idea of taking a shot at killing her where she rested. There was an open portion to the side, something that she could slide open or closed as she wanted. Currently it was open, only ever so slightly, so that some fresh air circulated through the cave system she’d claimed for her own and expanded. With her own hands. Because she could.

It was soothing, just to think about. More soothing to do, but unfortunately, she had work to do.

“Of course Vez, one moment – Do you want the weapon missions too, or –“

“No, just the ones that are c-critical to a-ah-actually h-helpin’ out. The weapons a-are nice an’ all, but I don’t need t’c-c-collect them a-as much as I need to get the S-s-sundial s-stable. Once that’s h-handled, I think we just have to do a lil bit more and then we c-can get back to w-workin’ on fuh-figurin’ out everythin’ that’s going on with the P-pyramid an’ th’Nightmares an’…everything else.”

She sighed, leaning forward, resting her forehead in her palms.

“Alright. Saint-14 needs...” Loxling went on, detailing the task list.

It didn’t matter how hard she worked, it never really seemed to get any smaller. Always more work, forever another disaster.

Vez chuckled under her breath, running her hands through her choppy, short, ash-blonde hair. Easier to deal with her various helms if she just kept her hair short. But she remembered what it was like when she first came back – hair nearly to her waist, gorgeous, curled. The first time she had taken a scorch cannon to the chest and woken up smelling like burnt hair had disabused her of the idea of keeping her hair long.

She looked down at her notebook, where she had, again, written out the list as Loxling had dictated it. It never got shorter. Even when she had the momentary burst of adrenaline and purpose when she managed to do yet another impossible thing it was always –

“Next week is Iron Banner,” Loxling said, quietly. “Saladin will want to see you in the lists, at least enough to make a good show.”

The door to her cave swung open, a breeze pushing it wide. That had been a problem as of late. She’d slammed the door shut too hard a while back and hadn’t gotten around to fixing it just yet.

“Y-yeah, I know. C-can you get the door?”

“…Yes, uh. Vez?”

“What is it, L-Lox?”

“Visitor.”

* * *

“Oh,” Saint-14 said, quietly, under his breath, finally noticed and noticing the Young Wolf, _His Guardian_ , sitting at a table.

Out of her robes, she looked so much smaller, far more delicate. He had known she was Human, but he’d never seen her outside of her armor. All of his memories of her, everything he had committed to so many different memory banks to make certain that it was never lost, not even a chance of it, not while he was trapped in the maelstrom of the Forest, had been the armor, _her_ armor, resplendent. Without it, out of it, casual, relaxed? She was...she was small.

Without her helm, the robes, the boots, in simple clothes, hunched over her desk, she looked…

“Visitor,” the little Ghost said, blinking between him and her.

“Nyet, no no, no, my deep apologies, I did not know this place was –“ he started, his hands coming up, waving the Ghost back, looking quickly between her Ghost and her.

“Saint Four Teen?” she said slowly, _deliberately_ , rising, and turning to him.

He didn’t know she had a face tattoo, a dark green line that speared down from her lower lip, down her chin, down her throat. Under the robes, it would have ended there, but she was wearing a more open tunic and not the usual under-armor thinsuit, so he could see how far down that line went, and it was far, far further than he anticipated.

It was _Her_.

Her voice sounded different when it wasn’t being modulated and transmitted from behind the great helm she wore, and chirping between Ghost-link. Warmer. More vibrant. More _alive_ in a very pointed way that made a few very complex feelings start to unravel in his brain-chips. He couldn’t think of anything to say, just watching her, his own helm covering his expression as he grappled with what he was supposed to say to Her. Of All Guardians. Her.

“The Vanguard have sent you. Loxling, m-m-“ Vez aborts the sentence quickly, switching to a different word. “Fetch the gear, kindly,” she said, straightening, shaking her hand out.

He saw the spiderwebbing of scars on her hands for only a moment before her gloves were on. The pull of her brows, the microexpressions that flickered across her face too fast for a human to stop or even see, but he was an Exo, and he saw them, as fast as they came:

Surprise, resentment, denial, relaxation, calm, acceptance, frustration, anger, rage, calm, acceptance again.

“Ny-no, no, it’s not –“

The armor flashed away from where it was hung up next to him, and he watched it wrap around her again, familiar to her, as familiar as his armor – when was even the last time he had taken his off? –

“If I m-mi-…If I ignored a request, I will apologize when we are there, what is the issue?” she said stiffly, slowly.

“I…just wanted to feed the birds,” he said, holding out the little bag of birdseed he had brought. “I used to come here. Long time ago.”

With her helm on, he couldn’t see the expressions anymore, but her head tilted to the side, exaggerated by the massive horns on either side of the helm. He found himself mirroring her, tilting his head as well, considering how strange the gap between the last time he had been here and now was. When he had been here last, it had belonged to no one but him, and even then it belonged to the birds more than it belonged to him.

Now, it was her home. A place decorated and changed by her hand. A place that, apparently, not many knew about.

From behind her there was a soft peep. Saint-14 turned to the sound instinctively, reaching out with the birdseed. The window was open at one end, where a small cluster of healthy, fat pigeons sat, cooing over the littlest pigeon of the group.

“You…w…wanted the birds?” she said, repeating him, turning to the birds as well. “Oh. They n-nest here. I have a lil’ tree for th-…for them to s-sit in.”

She gestured to the little wooden stand, packed with a nest for the little bird, still fledging.

“Oh,” Saint said, excitement and love creeping into his voice. “It is perfect, just so dyelicate. May I?”

Vez nodded, stepping away, her gun flashing out of her hands. She watched, Saint completely enamored and nearly forgetting about her as he moved to the birds. His steps were gentle, he cooed under his breath to them, and she watched, her face hidden behind her helm. Tears pricked at the corner of her eyes.

She stood, silent, at attention, unfaltering as Saint doted on the birds. He was lost to her in those moments, focused entirely on the birds, greeting them, talking animatedly, if hushed, about their great-grandparents, how he’d helped one of them get out of their shells when they had gotten stuck in the hatching, how much he had missed them and thought about them while he had been gone, and look, he was like them, people called _him_ Pigeon too, it was good, right?

She didn’t know if she wanted to laugh or cry, so she settled instead on standing there, awkwardly, watching one of the heroes of the Last City and his birds.

 _He idolizes you, you know_ , Zavala’s voice said in her ear again.

A shiver ran down her spine. Saint looked up at her just in time to notice. She froze, keeping the need to roll the tenseness in her shoulder out.

“Ah, the draft, it is cold, yes?”

“Not so much, no, it’s f-f-fine,” she said, reflexively, before even really checking if she _was_ cold. And, reflexively, the next words came tumbling out of her mouth before she could stop them. Too fast, jumbled, stammered. “If you w-want to come visit them, f-feel free. I’ll m-make sure when the door is f-fixed you have access.”

A muscle under her eye twitched, her helm masked it. She was too used to giving all of her personal space away and she had just done it again.

She was not expecting the shocked sound of joy from Saint-14, the way he stood up from the birds and walked towards her, sweeping her into a hug, lifting her despite the four inches of height that separated the top of her head from his. It was easy for her to forget how strong Titans were, but Saint lifted her easily, spinning her in a neat circle that made her feel all too much like a delicate woman again.

“Oh _thank_ you, my friend!”

He couldn’t see the smile that spread across her face, but it was there. She couldn’t reach around him, he’d pinned her arms in, but it didn’t feel bad. If it had been anyone else, anyone else in the whole world, she would have tried to get away, but Saint-14, exuberant and excited, was already putting her down and turning back to the birds, carefully naming them all, patting the more inquisitive ones very, very gently, talking all the while.

Vez watched him for a moment longer and then, still in her gear, not so comfortable that she could readily be seen without it, she went back to her desk, back to her work. Her hands were steady, her lettering careful. Saint-14 talked with the birds, and she, quietly, spoke with Loxling.

* * *

“You are here, Guardian? Why? Is _big_ party down in City, I hear all invited!”

Saint-14 had come in, the door chirping just once before unlocking and letting him in, giving her enough time to transmat her robes and helm back on. Or at least, that was what she had done all the previous times Saint-14 had come up to visit the birds. The Dawning was winding down, in one of its last days. The big party day. All the cookies had been given out, Saint had more cookies than he would ever be able to eat, but he had never stopped accepting them.

He’d spoken, first, to the helm hanging by the door, looking up at it, confused. He had shown up at a few of those parties, at the many invitations of many Guardians, but, as he looked down to her boots. It didn’t seem like she’d gone anywhere.

She wasn’t at her desk. The window was open but there were no pigeons there right then. He had a small gift, wrapped in bird-edible paper. He’d asked Ikora for where he could find a recipe for birdseed paper and she had happily gone about finding that for him, delighted at such a strange, but banal request. He understood. He had given similar requests to Guardians who had just wanted to help _him_ of all people.

But the birds could…probably wait. They weren’t there right now, at least. He could leave the treat for them to find later.

He rounded the corner, looking to the right, towards her more private home-areas.

“Yeah, mos’ people s-s-say that an’ then they get all squiffy when I fuckin’ sh-sh-sh…when I sh-sh-“ She stopped speaking, huffing sharply, closing her eyes, brows furrowing as she _focused_. “…When. I. Come. By.”

She exhaled, long and slow, relieved, and opening her eyes.

“S’I’dun go. Lettim h-have ‘eir par’ies.”

“You…are drunk.”

The kitchen, her bedroom, and a room that he assumed was her armory were all lit, but she was leaning up against a wall near the kitchen, her clothes rumpled, a bottle of amber liquor in her lap, staring out the window.

The window faced away from the City. It was dark.

“Oh y-y-yea, ‘ _c-credibibly_.”

Carefully, he put the gift down on the little nest-tree the Guardian had installed, and then turned to her again.

“Where is your Ghost?”

“Sentter to party. Chang’d’t’shell.l…ll……..S-She deserves a n-n-ni – a ni -…a good time way from here’n a p-puh-party. Sssssides, she’s works hard..s-s... Deserv’s it.”

“So you are here alone?”

She shrugged, gesturing with her bottle, back towards her kitchen.

“Whasnew. Y’wan one? Athhhink’ve g-got – I’ve got – I…vodka…smwhere.”

Pausing, she makes a face, scrunching her brows down and screwing her mouth up.

“N’yer S-Saint fuh..fourteen. You’ve par’ies n’ people t’see. Y’shund g-go s-ssee ‘emall. S’many Dawnins y’misst.”

Saint-14 watched her. Without the helm…he understood why she wore it. Her expressions carved themselves into her face as she felt them, and when she stuttered, she’d turn her head and close her eyes, trying to focus. She was so, intensely, exceedingly, expressive. She spoke and her body spoke with her. With her helm on, maybe he would not have picked up on how _pained_ that was, maybe with the muffling, the flattening between her mouth and the world around her he would not have noticed the clench in her jaw and the way her emphasis fell on how much other people wanted to see him.

“Would you like me to go?”

She blinked again, unshed tears in her eyes reflecting frissons of Void-Light. They were there only for a moment, and then she shook it away. The walls of the Last City were high but nowhere near as high as the walls that Saint-14 watched go up around her emotions.

“S’Dawning, S-Saint. S’for you t-to do as y’want…” Vez said, carefully trying to speak around her inebriation. She struggled to her feet, bracing her elbow against the wall behind her. “Is’…it..is your time, back in your home. Y’should s-spend i’wi’the people who ‘preciate you. Who y’wanna…b-be with.”

He took a moment at that. Being called Saint alone was a familiarity he had not thought she would offer to him. But. The way she phrased this…

“Where is vodka, then, Guardian? I will stay.”

She blinks.

“Other p-p-peo-“

“You said ‘spend this time with those I wish to be with’. I wish to be here. I will stay.”

“O-oh.”

She leaned back against the wall, looking at him, her eyes still wide. Unbelieving.

“U-uh. Th’liquor i-is in th-th’k-kitch-hen,” she stammered, gesturing. “S-sorry it’s n-not s’well or-rgani-i-zed.”

He tilted his head at her, the large crest of his helm exaggerating the movement. Vez’s head tracked it, flicking up from the center of his faceplate to the mohawk.

“You, ah, are okay with this?”

“Yyyea. S-sorry, jus’ I-I-I,” she exhaled, frustrated. “I didn’t s’pect th-th-that.”

She blinked, quite a few times, re-centering herself. Reflexively, she turned her gaze away from him, not moving her head.

Saint-14 pondered, again, how much of this was hidden by her usual helmet. How much of her was purposefully obscured away behind that mask? Was this, despite what she said, something she was not entirely comfortable with?

Carefully, he moved to her kitchen, finding the vodka easily. Warlocks tended to think in ways that were purposefully easy to follow as soon as you were even the slightest bit comfortable with them. He had spent so much time thinking about her, going over the memories of her that he had carefully, jealously stored throughout the centuries, and especially in the last few weeks, that figuring out where she’d put the vodka in her kitchen was…sensible.

By the time he came back out to where she was, she was back in her previous position on the ground, staring at the window. Saint-14 looked at her for a moment, and then, with a sigh, took his helmet off, putting it on the ground before sitting next to her. Vez turned to him, smiling weakly, the sadness not leaving.

“Thank you, for sharing, Guardian.”

Her smile brightened and she shifted where she had been sitting to briefly nudge his shoulder with hers.

“A’course, i-i-is my pleasure.”

It had been not so long since the last time he had drank, thanks to the many many parties and all of the festivities that yes, he had been dragged into. But he sat next to the Guardian, feeling the roiling waves of biting Void-cold that rolled off of her as she started relaxing and settled, ever so slightly, in. It was not as awkward as it could have been, though he was keenly aware of it being _her_ , as much as, he supposed, she was aware it was him.

She drank, slowly relaxing back down to where she had been when he had first come in. A comfortable silence filled the air, and she did not comment on his bare face plate, the same way he did not ask after her bare face. It had been…since the first time that he had startled her since he had seen her face, and, drunk as she was, he figured it probably wasn’t the best time to bring up why it was that she always wore her helm.

He knew why he wore his, at least.

He drank, she drank, and dulled through the mountain and distance, the booms of fireworks only drew a moment of tenseness from the both of them.

“The announced fireworks, they still bother you?”

“Ehhappens.”

“Me too. Vex explosions, they do not sound like that, but…it is still new again.”

He drank, looking out the window, the lights from the fireworks filtering across the clouds outside, the bright flashes of color muted into something else.

“What a concept. New _again. I_ t was old once, now it is new. My home. Old once, a favored memory, something I yearned to see again, and now, I am back and it is –“ he sighed, looking back to her. Vez was looking up at him, her eyes wide. “It is much to deal with all this.”

Vez sighed, and leaned against his shoulder. He did his best to stay still even as a jolt of something that cleaved close to being Arc-Light shot through his chest. He settled on just taking another drink of his vodka and letting her settle against him. Sometime in the silence before this, he must have dismissed his heavy chestpiece and spiked pauldrons because she curled next to him without skewering herself.

“Iss all new t-t’me. I’m. S-S-So young. As Guardians go. Tragedy. A-After tragedy. Just. G-G-Geddup n’go, n’fight n’fight n’fight…sommore.”

She sighed again, heavy. The exertion of speaking clearly took a lot out of her.

“Iss..impossible t’stop. Cause l-l-l-like. Even now. All-I thinkkabout is how is how is how… I shoul’ be doin’ m-m-more, yea? S-Sh-Shoul’ be…s-should be…s-sh…” she huffed, leaning away from Saint, and back into a more appropriate place of personal space. His shoulder ached, suddenly too warm where she had been. “Issa lot. C-Conssantly, always w-wi’me. Wha’ever I d-do I have’t worry ‘bout l-like, wha’ I could be d-doin’ inssead, right?”

He furrowed his brow plates, watching her, staying quiet for just a little while longer.

Her eyes went glassy as she stared out the window, the clouds above still lit with the reflections of the fireworks in the distance. For a while, again, she was quiet, just drinking from her bottle as her brow drew down.

“Sorry. N-nuh-not Dawnin’ propri-p.rorpriate. Oh! Oh’i’now,” she says, standing up quickly, reaching back to scramble to keep her balance. “We-we should _dance_ , Sain’, we sh’dance.”

Smiling, she looked down at him, holding her hand out. He took it without thinking, and she pulled him to his feet, not releasing his hand for a heartbeat too long, looking at him and grinning – beaming – at him.

“We need music?” he asked as she wrapped an arm around his waist.

“Oh, n-no, no no, no music, we can dance wi’out music, can’t we?”

Vez, humming, stepped backwards, and Saint-14 moved instinctively, following her lead. He didn’t even need to think about it. She laughed , leaning down to press her forehead to his. It was brief, like everything else in a Guardian’s life, and then they were dancing across her room, only birds curiously looking up over the wrapping they were pecking at to witness this. The Greatest Titan Who Ever Lived laughing, chuckling, and following the Young Wolf’s lead as she waltzed through her rooms. No music. Just them and the birds and the occasional flash of light from the fireworks elsewhere.

They danced, just the two of them.

Alone, away from the Last City and the weight of being _that_ to so many people, they danced. Titan, Warlock, Guardian as they were, they danced and allowed themselves to fall into the rhythm of being away from it all. Just an Exo and a human, war-torn and battle-scarred but still just...people.

* * *

“You _must_ tell how you got these scars, little Warlock!” he said, perhaps a bit loud, but there were a few empty bottles of vodka mixed in with her bottles now and she was halfway into his lap, lounging with her legs tangled with his and leaning against him.

She held her hands out in front of her, turning them back and forth. Light glittered over the silvered scars, some keloided, a particularly nasty one wrapping a bit around her wrist.

“Oh, th-that? Durin’ R-R-Red…war, yea? No light, had t’p-p-punch through a-a-a window t’gettin a fuckin…a house or s-some shit. Before I got t-to Ha-awth-thorn’d. Was s-starvin’. Sliced m-m-m’hand summin t-terrible.”

She huffed.

“Wish’I’wassa better s-s-story f’you. Seems dumb. You’re Saint fuh-fuh…You’re _Saint_. I punchet’a w-window cause I was h-hungry…”

“Oh, but they are beautiful, like all of you.”

Blinking she pulled away, just slightly, focusing on him. He was peering up at her, lavender backlights shining bright around his smile.

“A-ah? That’s…”

Vez took a moment to collect herself, but didn’t take her hand out of his, or indicate any discomfort beyond just being startled.

“Thank…you, S-Saint,” she finally settled on saying, smiling at him.

He smiled back, the lights across his throat and mouth brightening near-white before darkening to a deep, contented purple.

“You know, p-p-purple is a good color f’you, Saint. L-l-looks . Good.”

His smile got wider. The compliment made the same bright feeling in his chest start to flicker again, faster now. This was _His_ Guardian, the Woman who had pulled him out of the dark, who had stormed House Rain with him, who had come every time he had been truly and completely convinced that hope was lost, that all things were terrible and torn down, who had given him a glimpse into a future he had never been capable of dreaming of and had dragged him back from the desperation of death.

And she was just here. Sitting next to him, curled up against his by-far larger frame, smiling. There was a small scar on her lower lip, to the side of her tattoo that pulled her smile a little sideways when she grinned.

“Thank you, Vez.”

Oh, he would spend another thousand years in the Infinite Forest if he knew he would get to see the smile that broke across her face at her name.

“Y-you dindt…c-call me Guardian. _Everyone_ c-calls m-me Guardian.”

“Your name is Vez, yes?”

“Y-y-yes! B-but…” she took another breath, closing her eyes, **focusing**. “I like it when you call me Vez. It is nice. To hear. You. Say. That.”

Again, she finished her thought and her eyes fluttered open, and she _smiled_.

His own grin brightened his face, sending fingerlings of purple light across her skin as his backlights shone even fiercer. She beamed at him. He took another drink of his vodka and she mirrored him.

Chirruping under her breath, she leaned in and rested her head on his shoulder. He didn’t freeze up this time, just turned and gently touched his mouth to her forehead. It was a quick kiss, a reflexive display of affection and Vez melted into him, the tension flowing out of her all at once. It always astonished Saint, how much the human body could just go completely boneless and relaxed.

She did not move away, this time, as he shifted, just slightly, to better cradle her against him. The Void burned in them both, and while that could sometimes make it too cold, if only one of them was full with the unending call of the Void. But with both of them radiating the cold it was just…comfortable. It hummed between the two of them, resonating back and forth and back and forth, lulling like the waves of a deep and wide sea between the two of them.

* * *

It felt like no time had passed, and then Saint-14 blinked himself awake, an internal sensor alerting him to the fact that it was two hours before he was to be in the Hangar to work with the other Guardians. But…his was right here, curled into his arm still, sleeping lightly. He hardly moved, one of the benefits to being an Exo, even though his chest rose and fell, so he was afforded time a-plenty to regard her as she slept.

He didn’t want to go. He didn’t want to leave her side. He didn’t want to go as much as he would need to. There was no telling what would come in the days that would pass, what would take them apart. It had taken literal acts beyond reckoning to get them together, in the same time stream, after everything that had happened to him, to make sure that he was not lost in time and…

He sighed, too much rising up in him all at once, the fondness he felt for this poor Guardian, His Guardian just too much for him to articulate excepting in that sound. She stirred, ever so slightly, in his arms, blinking and turning her head, exhaling sharply.

“Ooh, L-l-loxling, hangover, c-can yoouuuoh…Saint Four Teen. Oo-oh,” she stammered as her brain pieced together everything that was happening in her surroundings.

She looked down at their tangled forms, legs twined, his arm defensively cradling her shoulders, her own slung around the back of his waist, fingers tucked into the gap between his hip plate and the synth-weave skin beneath that. Her other arm was resting on his chest, comfortable, and his hand was gently on her elbow, holding it in place.

She blinked, confused, and then looked up at him. Questioning. Her expressions were so…beautiful. He stared at her, perhaps a moment too long, but she didn’t move and neither did he.

“Good morning, Vez,” he said, softly, leaning over to press his forehead to hers.

There was a pause, brief, barely considering, and then she leaned up into his touch, her hand gliding up his chest, his neck, to cradle his jaw, and then she kissed him. Gently, just a peck, but it was her mouth against his, before she drew away.

“Mornin’, Saint.”

She didn’t pull all the way away from him, looking at him, her eyes brimming with hope. Oh it cut straight through the wiring in his chest. Her eyes flicked from his mouth back up to his eyes. Her tongue, delicate, pink, licked her lips as her gaze again dropped to his mouth.

He swallowed, hard, the cording in his throat constricting as he considered just what it was that was happening. What _could_ happen. It was dizzying, and it wasn’t because of a hangover or any vodka left in his system. No.

Oh no. No, he was sober and he was still staring at the tattoo on the bottom of her lip, wanting to run his fingers and mouth across and down that tattoo.

“Vez…”

His voice rumbled overlong on the ‘z’, drawing it out, savoring it on his tongue. He got to call her by her name. He did. Not Guardian, never that. She had given him her name to use.

Her pupils blew out wide, her breathing hitched and oh, no. Oh no. Oh no he wanted to kiss her and –

“Guardia…Vez. Ya khochu…ya – I want ki-, to - to…kiss, you.”

His words got tangled up, languages blending together as he stared into her eyes. Geppetto was going to tell him he didn’t have time, that there were only two hours and Geppetto _knew_ how long he had thought about this exact thing, how much it had been in the backmost processes of his mind, hovering there, a pleasant fantasy that was now so, very very close.

She smiled, broadly, tilting her head to the side, looking him in the eye again.

“Y-you’re very p-polite, Saint.”

She bit her lower lip and he did everything in his power to keep his eyes on hers and not think about how he wanted to do the same.

“Well, it, you see I –“

Her mouth touched his again, questioning, and too gentle, and his voice cracked, breaking into a thousand fractals of static. He’d have been embarrassed by that but her mouth was on his and he, oh he kissed her back, he kissed her back gently but with the passion that had been burning in his chest for ages now, his hands sweeping up her back to gently – so gently- cradle the back of her neck with both of his hands.

How long had it been since he had touched another, skin to skin, no gloves, no armor, no helmet, nothing? How long…how long…

She pulled herself into his lap, daring, bold, angling her mouth against his, a low vibrating hum starting somewhere in her chest as the Void-Light in her began to wake up and make its presence known. The fact that she also ground herself against his hardening cock while humming contentedly with her actual vocal chords made a lot of things much harder to focus on.

He didn’t grab at her, no, he was soft, and gentle, like he cradled his pigeons, but Vez preened under the touch as his hands were hesitant at first, sliding carefully, slowly, almost in a dreamlike fugue. His eyes flickered and then shut, and he gave himself over to the sublime pleasure of it. He didn’t grab her, he didn’t want her to feel like she couldn’t get away if she wanted to.

Vez didn’t quite share the same compunctions, slanting her mouth across his, lacing her fingers at the back of his neck, pulling him up against her, harder and more eagerly than he had been expecting.

“Ve-“

The moment his mouth parted even the slightest bit, her tongue swept in, cold and sparking with the Void. It tasted like oblivion and Saint-14, in the years that he’d thought of her, deep in the bowels of the Infinite Forest, had never dreamed of something so sweet as the taste of her mouth, still heavy with the taste of alcohol last night.

She moaned when he finally reciprocated, the sound tumbling out of her and vibrating against his all at once oversensitive mouthplates. Her blunt teeth nipped at the corner of his mouth, urging him to open his mouth wider, to give in, to give _more_ , and he did, he let her Void consume him, he fell into it, he let it overwhelm him.

His hands tightened on her waist, pulling her almost crushingly tight against his chest -  
It wasn’t tight enough, the yearning of the Void pulled her deeper, closer –

She bit the corner of his mouth hard, Void-Light carving in there, her hips pressing against his-  
It wasn’t enough, the yearning of the Void pulled him deeper, closer –

He laid her out on the floor of her home, bracing himself up with one elbow planted near her head as his other hand grabbed at her waist, her ribs, pushing his thumb up under the hem of her tunic, servos whining over-loud as he gave in.

“ _Yes_ ,” Vez whined under him as he slid his knee between her legs, her hands pulling at his chest-plating, her mouth working across his.

He couldn’t think, he didn’t _want_ to think, he wanted nothing more than to keep kissing his Guardian.

Vez’s chest heaved against his, her heartbeat racing overhard. Saint was over-aware of everything about her, all of his ancient and honed senses clued into her. He had spent so long, so long, so _long_ aching for her, replaying every one of their few interactions, talking about them in glorious, florid detail, reliving them in the quietude of his own privacy, and now, and now, and now –

His thumb rolled across the bare skin over the bottom of her ribcage.

There was a ridge in the bone – an old break from before she became a Guardian – something imperfect, something private, something that the Light couldn’t heal and he _touched_ it. She gasped into his mouth, her chest jerking upwards, her breath stuttering out across his plates.

“Ya…I…U tebya…vkus…a-aa-ahH,” he tried, his voice failing. Too many things happening in his head all at once, a thousand trillion diagnostics firing off over and over again, hypercataloguing everything in a vain attempt to experience this moment in every single timeline that had ever existed.

_(Her breath was composed of – vodka, he could taste the vodka from last night from when he had kisse - -ty four percent carbon dioxi- - desperation it tasted desper- - cent nitrogen – the color of her tattoo was a perfect #0A5045 and – exerted thirteen pounds per square inch of pressure with her ha- )_

Her fingers, digging in, under his plates, mirrored his thumb’s motion against her ribcage, flicking deeper, under, into hidden places no one had touched in centuries, into places that had only ever been ripped apart by weapons, never touched so gently, moved with a careful, learned confidence.

“I know, I taste good, more, Saint, more,” she hissed against his mouth, her eyes half-lidded, looking at him, pupils blown so far out wide that if he hadn’t known better he would have sworn they were as black as the event horizon.

Saint-14 could only manage a roar of assent, the demand carving through him. His hands dropped to her hips, he pulled her legs wide and then with a relish that had been denied to him for so long, slid her across the floor, pulling her closer, pinning her down underneath him, letting himself revel in the feeling, the friction of her hips grinding against his, the huffing laugh of surprise from her at the movement, and then the guttered out groan from her as he swept both hands back up to cradle her neck and kiss her harder and harder still.

The cold of the Void, the deep resonant humming of the birth and destruction of all things pulsed between them, in time to the rolling of their tongues and the grinding of their bodies.

He craved so much more. He needed, he had ached for something so much less than this, and now to have _this,_ to have _Vez_ , to have **_HIS GUARDIAN_** under him, gasping his name, urging him on, pulling on the back of his head, her fingers always quick to dance under plate and between wires. He kissed her with the hunger of someone who had wanted this for too long and never let themselves want it – and the best part, the part that had him sliding both hands up under her tunic, had him pulling her closer to him, had him wishing he’d the forethought to say something more romantic than the chattering moans that came from his chest – was that she wanted it too.

“ _Fuck_ , Saint, yes, right there,” she said, shivering under him as his thumbs rolled across the underside of her breast.

Something in his chest stopped and then started again, over-loud, scratching. She laughed, arching herself into him.

His mouth slid from hers, leaving overheating kisses across her chin, down her throat, careful not to bruise her tattoo, until he could bury his face in the crook of her neck and mouth at the tender skin there.

“ _Vkusnyy_ ,” he growled, biting her neck harder, grinding his hips against hers, letting her feel his cock, hard and heavy and blisteringly hot.

The full body shudder that wracked her had Saint grabbing all the harder at her, biting down where his mouth had been. Vez groaned his name, grabbing at the back of his head, pushing his mouth down harder against her skin. Guardians were hardy things, used to war and battle, and her soft organic body did not mind the harshness of his so much. Not after all this time.

Words failed them, falling into a pattern of moans, grunts, and growled guttural almost-there words. Her tunic was removed hastily, tossed to the side, so Saint could slide his face down her chest, leaving hickies and bruises in his wake. He didn’t apologize. He wouldn’t apologize. Not for this, by the Light he wouldn’t apologize for this.

Her fingers were laced at the back of his skullplates, holding his head against her. Every time she chanced a look down at _Saint-14_ , it sent another lance of desire slicing through her chest. Somewhere deeper inside her mind she thought she should say something more profound, she was a warlock after all, but nothing managed to come out of her mouth but gasping pleasure and-

“…Saint-14.”

Geppetto’s voice broke the haze just long enough for Saint to look up from where he had been gnawing hungrily on the underside of her ribcage, working on leaving a lattice-work of hickies across her to replace her tunic. The earlier ones were already fading, and he really could not abide that. Everyone needed to know, they had to know, this was _HIS GUAR-_

“You’re needed in the tower, Saint. You’re late.”

He blinked, checking his internal processors for the time. He _was_ late, and by a good enough amount.

Vez sat up, propping herself up on one elbow, flushed, her hair sticking every which direction, sweat-slicked and panting.

“ _Fuck_ , who gives a shit, come here, Saint,” she growled, tugging on his arm.

Her legs were around his waist, he could feel the not at _all_ chaste squeeze of her thighs around his waist. Static flickered at the edges of his vision, and he looked away from Geppetto to kiss Vez again, rolling his body against hers. He kissed her hard, one of his hands tangling in her short hair, his thumb rubbing across her sweat-slicked brow, some subprocess or another cataloguing every minute taste, every moment and searing it into his memory chips. Her mouth tasted like his, tasted like hers, and it wasn’t until he felt Geppetto barreling into his hip that he pulled away, snarling just a bit at his partner.

“You’re late, Saint!”

He sighed into Vez’s mouth, and her tongue flicked out to coax one more kiss from him.

“I will be back,” he said, solemnly, looking her in the eye. “I would _like_ to come back.”

Vez nodded, grinning up at him.

“Not even time itself would keep you, I’ll see you when you’re done.”

Saint huffed, slowly picking himself up off of her. She stood, not bothering to put her shirt back on, still grinning at Saint. His armor flashed on, courtesy of Geppetto definitely trying to get him to not go back to kissing Vez. Because he’d been kissing Vez. Desire punched through him, harder than any minotaur had ever done, and he nearly tore something internal as he moved against himself in two directions.

Vez laughed, sidling towards him, her fingers tracing Void-Light over his helmet’s plate before kissing the dip over his mouth.

“Ya ne hochu uhodyt’,” he growled, reaching out to snake a hand around her waist and pull her against him.

His armor was heavy, the ridges and whorls and turns of it familiar to him, but now too stifling, too heavy, and in his way. Vez lingered there before taking a step back, blinking out of his grasp and gracefully seating herself back in her desk chair. Still shirtless, the bruises from his mouthplates fading, she grinned at him, before nodding to the door. He grit his teeth hard against the _need_ that clawed at him.

“I can hear your jaw popping. Relax. Go on. I’ll be here when you’re done. Come back soon.”

“Yes. **Yes.** ”

He offered her a polite, if a bit stiff bow before turning towards her door. He took a moment to…adjust himself before, with a nod to Geppetto, Saint-14 strode purposefully out of her home.

Vez allowed herself a small, private grin, licking her lips.

Loxling spun out of the air, looking between Vez and the door, blinking her lone eye and then spinning her shell about a half dozen times, squishing herself up, all of her fins fluttering, before bursting out in a shower of sparks, startling Vez.

“You didn’t stutter _once_ ,” Loxling exclaimed, zooming around Vez.

“A-aah! L-loxling…” Vez stammered in response, turning bright red and covering her face. “S-stop it!”

“He’s coming back tonight? We have to get ready!”

* * *

Saint had never once rushed through his work. He had prided himself on his diligence, his determination, his title as the Greatest Titan that Ever Lived being not a title he had earned outright, but one that he had been given to drive him to consistently be worthy of it.

Today?

Today he maybe did not live up to the minutiae of his status or title. Maybe today he was a little distracted. Maybe today the birds did not command all of his attention, and maybe today he spent a little longer than usual staring out into the distance when Guardians weren’t around him.

Maybe.

Maybe today he thought about how _his Guardian_ tasted, that he had not only kissed her, but kissed her hard and desperately up against the floor of her home, how he had held her in his arms and slept, how she had kissed him and kissed him and kissed him. She had _wanted_ to kiss him.

Maybe today he was happier he wore his helm at all times than usual because maybe today if anyone had been able to see underneath his helmet, they would have seen Saint-14, lovestruck, and grinning, in the direction of her home. Where he had an invitation to return to. To be with her. To _be_ with her.

* * *

“D-do I just.L-Loxling, I d-don’t think this is a-a-apropriate…” Vex worried at the collar of her robe. It was a simple one, silk and sheer lace, not fit for battle, but definitely meant for the sort of thing she had been halfway to doing when Geppetto interrupted.

“Hush you, you look amazing, and Saint’s not going to know what to do with himself. Come on. Don’t you _want_ to see what it’d be like to drop him to his knees?”

Vez blushed scarlet and looked down at herself.

“Y-you think s-so?”

“Of _course_ I do, besides, you bought that to get laid in.”

“W-well. Yes.”

“And won’t it be something nice, if –“

“Saint comes back and I look like this?”

“There we go.”

“I-it’s not too much?”

Loxling floats in front of Vez, rolling her eye.

“No! It looks good on you. Do you like it, or would you prefer to take it off, or something else?”

“S-somethingelse,” Vez says, looking away, flushing pink.

“Something to do with the outfit, something to do with Saint, or something else?”

“Th-the outfit.”

Vez was still talking, her face pointed at Loxling, but her eyes averted. Loxling had been a Lightsend, both in the literal sense and in the way Vez had found that few Ghosts really were. Loxling cared for her, and it seemed, in whatever great comedy of the universe, Loxling had also chosen to specialize her interest in reading Golden Age psychology textbooks.

Loxling had told her once that she had not been one of the Ghosts that had gone out and volunteered to search for her Guardian throughout all of the time. She knew that one day, she would know where her Guardian was, and until then, as she watched Guardians struggle, Light falter, and disease and death rip through the galaxy, she dedicated time and energy specifically into making sure that she was not like those other Ghosts that came back without their Guardians, not like the Ghosts who punished and pushed their Guardians too hard. And now, she used what she had learned to help Vez when her stutter got too bad.

Now, Loxling just waited, patiently, as they slowly worked through what it was that Vez needed to feel comfortable.

“The fit, the color, something else?”

“…C-can it be purple an-n-nd grey an’ gold like his a-armor?”

Loxling trilled, spinning up into motes of Light and exploding into fireworks.

“ _Yes_ absolutely!”

* * *

Saint-14 had stopped to buy flowers. A lot of flowers. He went and bought as many flowers as he could carry, found someone who had a bottle of his favorite vodka, and had gotten his plates buffed up and done his best to make himself look a little more presentable under his armor. Because he really was hoping he wouldn’t be wearing it for too much longer.

Arm full of flowers out of season and out of breath, Saint-14 had came up to the door of Vez’s home, and then stopped dead. He was – okay yes he had been thinking about what it was that he was going to get to do with his Guardian. Even if it was just a date – it was a date, with his Guardian. His Guardian. Vez. He was going to have a date with Vez.

Almost self-conscious for the first time in…eons, he looked to Geppetto, an unsaid question hovering around his mouth.

“You’re going to have to go in, Saint, you know you want to.”

The only thing that he could even think to say was a rough, staticked growl of uncertainty. He didn’t know what it was that he wanted, just that whatever it was that was that he wanted, it was the thing he wanted most in the entire universe in that moment.

He took a deep breath, and opened the door, stepping in.

As all the other times, her gear was hanging near the door, her helm and robes neatly in place. The interior was dim, candles flickering, arranged artfully.

His heart thumped over-heard in his chest. They were handmade, she’d been learning how to make them, and all of them, all of them were made by her hand. He felt so _fond_ of her that he needed to take a moment to collect himself before gently calling out into the darkness:

“Vez?”

His Exo ears picked up the sound of her moving before he could see her, but when he did, he damn near dropped the bottle of vodka. Geppetto spun out to catch it in a field, supporting it with his fins.

“H-hello, Saint,” she said shyly, a blush touching her cheeks.

She had been waiting for him, not fidgeting, and after she had set the candles, she had been enjoying herself just watching the way her candles burned, not minding anything, relaxing, letting herself be. That changed when she heard her door opened and a frisson of anxiety move up her spine.

Loxling pushed her along and then vanished.

Meekly, she grinned at Saint-14, holding an armful of flowers, Geppetto supporting a bottle of vodka and kept herself from worrying the edge of her robe.

“Good…evening, Vez, you – the color,” Saint said, fumbling his own words, blinking at her.

Deep, royal purple, with flecks of silver-grey thread made the cut of her robe seem…all the more alluring. Her hair had been carefully swept back and held in place with a gel that seemed to glitter and shine in the candle light, and the shadows that caressed the sides of her neck and her collarbones just dared him closer.

“Thank you…do, I d-don’t have enough v-v-vases, b-but I can send L-loxling w-with Geppetto t-to the City?”

Saint, already motioning for Geppetto to dismiss his armor paused at that, blinking owlishly at Vez. A fan somewhere deep in his chest whirred over-loud and habitually, he reached up and thumped his fist hard on his chest. The fan spluttered and stopped and Geppetto, next to him, just rolled his eye.

“That sounds lovely, Loxling, while our Guardians are predisposed, would you care to escort me back to the City?”

Loxling gave a proper little spin of her shell and gallantly floated over to Geppetto’s side, looking over her fin to wink at Vez before the pair of them vanished into motes of Light.

Alone in the dim light of a hundred candles, Saint looked to Vez, clicking his mouth plates together just briefly as he considered what he would like to do. He knew what it was that the Ghosts thought they were doing, he knew where the two of them had left off and he had been thinking about it so much and now – and now –

“Do you…want to...come to my room, Saint?”

She peeked up at him through her lashes, and Saint nodded, too overwhelmed with everything inside of him to manage words right then. She was so beautiful, so gentle and slow as she came to him, gathering the flowers from his arms and briefly burying her face in the petals, breathing deeply.

“They smell wonderful, Saint, thank you so much. I love them, thank you for th-thinking of me.”

“You were on my mind all day, Vez,” Saint replied smoothly, setting down the bottle of vodka and moving…closer to her.

Hesitantly, now without the morning bleariness that had removed all the sense of propriety, intensely aware of what it was that he was doing, Saint-14 reached out to gently cup her elbow in one of his hands. She looked at him, smiling, dustings of pollen across her face.

“Y-you were on mine too.”

Carefully, moving so that she didn’t dislodge Saint’s hand from her elbow, she put the flowers down.

“They’ll put them in the v-vases, when they come back home, th-then.”

Saint nods, stepping a little bit closer, leaning up against her, hoping that –

Vez looped both of her arms around his waist, pulled herself flush against him and kissed him hard. Her body was soft, the robe itself, some sort of Light construct, softer than anything he had ever felt. Saint-14 shuddered and kissed her back. He cupped the back of her neck in his hands, slanted his mouth against hers and kissed her as hard as he had that morning, trying to make up for all of the lost time.

Not just since the morning, but since the first time he had ever thought about such things. All of the time he had missed in the Forest, all of the many thousands of timelines where this never happened, all of the paracausal things that, in other places, had kept them apart.

He kissed her to make up for it all.

She backed him up against the wall, planting one of her hands on the wall and sliding her other hand up his side, her fingers dancing over the thin under-layer he wore. Not out of necessity, he was an Exo, after all but out of propriety. Geppetto had left him in his casual underclothes. It would’ve been presumptuous to just transmat himself completely naked.

The robe slid off her shoulder, and in the flickering light, he could see the deep, royal purple strap of her lingerie. Gold thread glinted and reflexively, he dipped his mouth down to the shining bit, nipping at it gently.

Vez shuddered, purring.

“Come on, t-to my bedroom, Saint,” she whispered into his ear, tugging him backwards a bit.

* * *

With a roar, Saint-14 pinned Vez to the wall next to her bedroom door, her legs wrapped around his waist. It had taken damn near a half hour, and now that he had her pinned up against a wall, it was going to take a good bit longer. Her lower lip was bruised, swollen from his kisses, and flickers of Void-Light were etching into his plates. Vez dug her fingers in to the synth-weave skin of his shoulder, clawing deeper and deeper and deeper.

He bit down on her shoulder, breaking the strap of whatever it was that she was wearing under that robe that was still tangled around her arms. Partially torn, he’d said something about getting her a nicer one and she had just laughed, she had laughed and purred and petted him.

Kissing was a messy thing, heated bruises raising on her skin, Loxling too far to heal things immediately, but Saint was drugged to hell on the taste of Vez’s mouth against his, the taste of her breath, of her skin, of the rasping edges where her skin broke. He bit at her, a little bit harder each time. Vez rewarded him with breathy exhalations, the sort of halfway there moans and groans that she so excelled at making with her vocal chords.

Saint-14’s head dipped down to her throat. She obliged the questioning press of his mouth-plates to the skin there, tilting her chin up, straightening just a bit to re-assert her height over him. His knees went weak.

He was the mightiest Titan. The greatest Titan who ever lived. His knees went weak, but that didn’t mean that he was going down just yet. But oh, he was ever going to go down.

Hands full of Vez’s ass, he reflexively tightened them when she growled at him, her hips rocking against his. She’d gotten his pants loosened on his hips and feeling – _feeling_ – just – he just -

“ _Bol’she_ ,” Vez hissed in his ear.

Whatever it was that she had expected from learning some little words of Russian, it was not to feel Saint-14 go completely, eerily, Exo-still against her. She waited a moment, startled by the sudden lack of movement, and incapable of moving him herself.

“D-did I s-say it wr-“

“Id-t- postel’- _kkcht_. Bed. Get. In bed,” he growled, his voice deep, his mouth plates not moving at all, the sound coming from the internal voice box.

Vez’s momentary concern vanished and she grinned. She twined herself around him a little bit tighter, and leaned in, back to his ear, nipping at the exposed wires just under his jaw.

“ _Take_ me, then.”

Whatever she was expecting, it wasn’t to end up on her back in her bed, under Saint-14 in what felt like a burst of speed so fast that it bent the realities of time itself, with him kneeling over her, pulling her robe wide open and hissing at the delight that greeted him. His Guardian, wearing his colors, dark purple straps criss-crossing her chest and hips, keeping herself delicately and deliciously covered. The same dull silver and glinting gold of his armor accenting all of the most delicious of places.

That _tattoo_ dancing down her throat, ending in a point on her sternum.

His mouth was on that tattoo nigh instantly, biting the skin. The bruises bloomed immediately, spreading darkly over her skin. She gasped, a hiccupping on a moan as he worked the straps loose on her lingerie.

“Y-yego razorvat’,” she hissed, her mouth stumbling over the unfamiliar words.

It didn’t matter to Saint-14, it really didn’t. She was trying, she had tried, and she had learned for him, just for him.

He pulled at the straps, slicing them open with his fingers, not being so brash as to tear, and even if he wanted to tear, he was so much stronger, his body made so much for war that the lace and ribbon just peeled away. She was naked, laying in the destruction of his lust. He wanted to _cry_.

Vez stretched beneath him, displaying all of her soft curves and delicate bones to him. The lights of his eyes glitched and flickered off for a moment as he just looked down at her. His guardian, his guardian, his Vez.

His mouth clattered against itself, the plates shuddering. Vez allowed him the silence, watching him, grinning. She did not rush him, not moving as he slowly slid his hands across her body, closing her eyes in pleasure as he brushed the synth-weave pads of his thumbs across her nipples, sighing as he briefly gripped at her ribs before sliding his hands further down to her waist, her hips.

His mouth followed the same path, and Vez pet the back of his skullplates. It was such a simple action of such deep intimacy, something Saint had not felt in…so long, that he collapsed against her chest, moaning brokenly, letting himself just revel in the moment as her fingers pet his plates, feeling out places that he had not felt the touch of another person in ages.

Vez pet him, for some time, honestly, just reveling in the feeling of it, of Saint barely moving as he whispered Russian prayers to the Traveler against her skin. She hadn’t had the time to learn a lot of it, and Loxling wasn’t around to translate for her, so it was just a purring, rolling worship. She let herself fall into the rhythms of it, delighting in the way his hands flexed and grabbed at her bones, the way he ran his mouth across her skin, his tongue flicking out to taste the curl of her bones under her skin.

Slowly, he worked lower, spending a long time pressing kisses and bruises into the leanness of her abdomen, working his fingers against the corded muscles that raced down her spine, pressing his face against any part of her that would give, or resist, until he was biting at the ribbons and lace that had ever so delightfully ornamented her hips, pulling it away.

Vez, startled, briefly flexed against him, and Saint could not take it as anything but an invitation. He could smell her arousal, salt-sweet and heavy on the air.

Her fingers grabbed at the back of his headplates and she gave just _such_ an overjoyed trill of pleasure that Saint-14 really had no choice. None at all, he’d say, if anyone ever dared to question why he did any of this. He had no choice but to pick her up by her hips and bring her sweetly seeping slit to his starving mouth.

“A-aah _hn_ , Saint!”

He may have been centuries out of practice, it could have been millennia since he had last done anything like this, but it was his Guardian, and he would do anything for her.

Her hands spasmed on the back of his skullplates, her body bowing, hips bucking. Saint knelt up, his knee touching her shoulder, lifting her hips up to his mouth, pushing her into an over-stretched shoulder stand so he could really get a deep angle on eating her out. His tongue, well, Exos didn’t _need_ tongues, not really, and there had been no food in the Forest to enjoy, so even though the last time he had enjoyed someone so thoroughly had been a long while ago, the memories were fresh, and his skills unmatched.

He was the Greatest Titan who ever lived.

His free arm wrapped around her waist, holding her in place easily, her long legs draped over his head. She may have said something, she could have been saying anything, but Saint was lost to the feeling of her opening to him, the stiffness of her clitoris as he licked his tongue over it, the quivering of her inner muscles as he delved deep inside of her. He wanted to taste everything of her, and whatever she was saying, it was lost in the rush of her pulse past his ears as her thighs tightened on either side of his head. Yes, he had other senses that he _could_ use to listen to her, and there were of course subprocesses listening out for her telling him to stop, in case she didn’t like this but.

He only heard pleasure, only heard her choking on his name, begging more, begging _Bol’she_ , trying her best to gasp out Russian to please him but faltering, falling into Universal and then deeper and deeper into delirious moans of ecstasy.

Saint-14 didn’t want to take his mouth away from her, not for a long, long, while. Hearing Vez cum, over and over again as his tongue and mouth and fingers worked relentlessly on her, stroking all of the sweetest parts of her body. For too long he had gone without being able to bring someone else pleasure like this. For too long he’d not been able to delight in the orgasms of another, in the connection, in the serving and the overwhelming decadence of it.

Vez, on her end, was barely capable of recognizing anything but the pleasure of it. Her mind, so keen and sharp and full of anxieties, for once in a very, very long time, had nothing in it. Nothing at all, no formulas running, no worries about what she needed to do or how she looked or how she had to present herself in order to be proper and correct. There was nothing. Nothing but waves and waves of that single blistering truth –

 _Saint-14 wanted her_.

Blood was pounding in her ears, her own gasping moans half-strangled into silence by her need to pay attention to the noises that Saint was making. Because, even with his mouth occupied, his voice box made delighted, guttered-out sighs. A fan in his throat was whirring over-loud and she could hear the needy swallows his over-taxed throat was making as he ate her out with gusto that would make even Calus blush.

Ooh, a thought for another time.

A new sound had entered the vocalizations Saint was making, a whimpering mewl at the end of his panted breaths. Vez, vaguely aware of things in the way that warlocks always were, felt his hips grinding against her back and spine, his cock hard and _intensely_ noticeable against her.

She couldn’t move well enough, with him holding her in a shoulder stand to eat her out, not enough to grind against him, but she felt him, the erratic jerking of his hips giving her more than a little bit of a look into just how much he needed her. He wanted her.

“S-uh _hhh_ ch a g-good _boy_ , Sa-a- _aH_ -int,” she stuttered, reaching up to pet his forehead, rocking her hips against his mouth, her vision going spotty as he shuddered and worked harder.

Her breath caught in her chest as another orgasm built in her, and words failed her as bursts of Void-Light exploded behind her eyes. She may have cursed, may have howled his name, may have done something with her fingers tightening on his skullplates, but she was vaguely, deliriously aware of Saint echoing her much the same way, his hips jerking erratically, his cock grinding against her spine, and warmth blooming against her skin.

Saint collapsed forward, quickly moving her legs off of his shoulders and putting them back around his waist so that he could nuzzle her neck and shakily breathe through -

“That, ahh, vkusnyy, so – you’re, I, a-yya…” he muttered, trembling, kissing the side of her neck over and over again, speaking directly into her skin.

He nuzzled her as she pet down his back, feeling him venting heat against her, the Void-Light in her thrumming contentedly. She was blinking the frissons of pleasure out of her eyes still, but Saint-14’s weight over her was …soothing.

She’d been crushed under collapsing buildings, had part of a cave system dropped on her head by a Hive God, she’d had her ribs crushed by being thrown into a Thresher. Vez did not usually find tight spaces particularly comforting, but with Saint-14…it was pleasant. Gentle. She could feel his cock stirring against her thigh after a short breather, but at the same time, Saint was already moving his kisses up her neck, across her jaw, biting the curl of bone, gently grinding his mouthplates against her bone.

She could smell herself on his faceplates, her slick sliding across her chin and jaw as Saint made his way back to her mouth, to kiss her more. To kiss her properly as he slid his thighs up between her legs, orienting himself against her, leaning his heavy body into her, letting himself feel her naked body against his. His plates dug in to her soft skin, molding her muscle and fat against the unmovable plasteel of his body. She sighed happily, welcoming the weight, moving her hands up and down his sides, dancing her fingers, alight with the Void, over the edges of plates, toying with wire, petting the hyper-sensitive synth-weave skin.

“Please, Vez, can I fuck you?” Saint panted against her mouth, asking while his mouth was busy biting and nipping and licking at her lips.

Vez did not respond immediately, just sighed and kissed him back, one of her hands coming up to cradle his face, guiding him in how she wanted to be kissed, letting him explore her, taste her, feel her. Carefully, she rolled her body under his, arching her back, flexing her hips, delighting in the answering grind of his hardening cock against the burl of her hipbone.

The dip there, she had never particularly found to be particularly sexy, but Saint, he ground himself in that divot, moaning so sweetly as his cock leaked pre against her skin. He panted her name, begging, asking, switching too quickly between Universal and Russian for Vez to keep track of just what it was that he was saying, but whatever it was, she loved hearing it.

It was _Saint-14_ in her bed, grinding himself against her wantonly, delirious with desire, begging for something she had already resolved to have herself that night, but it felt so good. Strange, to have such overwhelming attention and adoration paid to so many different parts of her, but it filled her with a sort of inner…sense of…something that she couldn’t tear herself away from.

“Ah-hh, _yes_ , Saint. Please,” she finally managed, when feeling the grind of his dick somewhere not inside of her was unconscionable.

She throbbed with need, with an ache that called out to be filled, and her mouth tingled with the lingering touch of Saint’s mouth on hers. He didn’t respond to her, no more than just shifted his hips, angled them differently, and then with a high-pitched whine from something mechanical in his throat, he slid home into her. Vez sighed, arching, flexing into him. His cock fit inside of her beautifully, a generous upward curve letting him just really drive her up the fucking wall.

His voice rose with hers, his hands dropped to her hips and he fucked her into the mattress. A Titan’s strength really could not be underestimated, and Vez, as The Young Wolf and so on and so forth had really not allowed herself to enjoy the carnal touches of another – too many people got too up in arms about who she was and insisted upon treating her differently in any number of ways. But Saint? He was the Greatest of all Titans, and he wanted her.

And he fucked like a goddamn golden age grav-train.

Vez lost anything like coherent thought, immediately just shattered on the absolute pleasure of it all. Pinned down beneath him, she just gasped and rolled her body in time with his. Saint moaned obscenely in her ear, growling mechanized adoration in Russian, driving himself into her with a near-desperation. It was too good to be believed, too good to not drown in immediately. He needed to do more, needed to have more. Holding her by her waist, holding her stable and steady so he could - he could –

He buried his face in the crook of her neck and bit down, holding himself stable there and letting himself succumb to every one of his instincts. Some things were never wiped away. He fucked her beautifully, listening, keenly aware of every last part of her, every reaction, adjusting himself until every stroke was rewarded with a whimpering moan from her.

His Guardian. His Guardian.

There was something so overwhelmingly sweet about it.

“Prekrasnyy,” he panted against her neck. Her skin was hot, flushed from the bruises, the hickies from his mouth, and without their Ghosts there, the bruises lingered longer, taking time to close and heal, even if they were still healing as they fucked. “Y-yeba-yebat’sya…”

He was stuttering, trying to commit too many things to his memory banks at once, and underneath him, Vez wasn’t making things any easier. The blistering edge of his own orgasm was coming back upon him, tightening, winding around his gut. His eyes rolled, the light in them flickering in time with his ragged gasps.

His own distraction left him open to a momentary play by Vez.

With a movement that belied how strong Vez was, she toppled Saint-14, twisting him onto his back and mounting him, grinning down at him as she seated herself on his cock. Deeper, deeper than he had been before and with a garbled, glitching cry, Saint-14 came, thrusting up into Vez, all the way to his hilt.

His entire body twitched underneath her, and suddenly, overwhelmingly aware of it all, Vez stared down at him, biting her lip until she tasted blood. She waited, patiently, for Saint to come back to himself, for his lights to stop flickering in pleasure. When it seemed like she had his attention back, she gave a pleased little wiggle on top of him, eliciting another round of intensely exuberant curses.

His cock jumped inside her, and his hips popped up, just briefly.

“T-kt-ty…Ty pya-ahh- _ahh_ -are you, t-tkt-trying to k-kt-kill me?” he groused, planting his hands on her thighs and rolling his hips up into her again. It wasn’t time to stop, he didn’t want to stop, she was covered in bruises he had put there, some in the shape of his own plates and wires.

Vez licked her bloodied teeth, staring down at him with the Void-Light sparkling in her eyes.

“You survived the Infinite Forest for eons, Saint.”

He huffed, kneading her thighs, grabbing them nearly hard enough to bruise.

“True, da.”

Her grin grew wider and she leaned down over him, splaying her hands across his chest. He blinked stars of Void-Light out of his eyes.

“You can survive me fucking you for a few more rounds.”

Mirroring what he had done earlier, she trailed kisses up his neck, letting the Void burn and carve its way into his body, leaving her teeth imprinted in the metal of his jawline until her mouth was pressed back up against his. Through hooded eyes, she watched him. Saint stayed perfectly still, watching her, waiting for whatever it was that would signal that he could move, that he could go again. That she had finished her thought.

Just once, lazily, she lifted her hips and dropped them back down, her ass slapping heavily against the synth-weave and plasteel of his thighs. He jumped, blinking and thrusting instinctively, despite the overstimulation and the sudden quick flashes of warnings in the HUD for that.

“Da?” she purred at him, grinning.

Saint-14 looked up at her – _He looks up to you, you know_ \- and everything she had been worried about washed away. There was nothing to fear, no concern, nothing in the entire world, in the universe, that mattered more than what she was doing just then. Saint-14 adored her, he looked at her with such tenderness, such gentle and genuine awestruck wonder that she had to take pause. She looked at him, really looked at him.

Moving carefully, she reached for one of his hands on her thighs and laced her fingers with his.

“Da,” he said softly, looking up at her, smiling.

“Well then let’s see what the Greatest Titan can take, then,” Vez growled, cockily, leaning back down and hissing as Saint’s cock dragged against a spot inside her that made the Light in her chest roar.

* * *

“You think we should announce ourselves as we come in, Geppetto?” Loxling asked, a plastic bag with a pretty vase in it hanging from her fins.

“Oh, absolutely not.”

She laughed, zipping in a circle and then phasing through the door.

Vez, covered in bruises and just barely wearing her robe looked up to the both of them, sighing as Loxling’s proximity immediately started accelerating her wound’s healing.

“Happy to see you Geppetto. Saint needs his hip joint fixed, I fucked a joint out of place and he insisted that we keep going, so he can’t really get out of bed right now.”

Loxling lit up at the extended sentence from Vez, completely without stammer or stutter.

Geppetto sighed and started moving towards the bedroom, calling out in Russian to his Guardian, who, still breathless, answered in turn.

Vez looked at Loxling, grinned broadly and very quietly, so as not to alert the others in her home, leaned in and said: “Thank you. He loved it.”

Loxling suppressed her overjoyed trill and settled on spinning up in a bright circle.

“You’re going to have to tell me about it! Girl talk, you promise?”

Vez shrugged.

“When I’m done with him, I’ll tell you everything.”

From the back, the Russian conversation came to a lull, and after a pause, Saint-14 spoke up.

“The leg is repaired, Vez, so w-“

Vez vanished from the table, blinking once, to the hallway so she could wink over her shoulder at Loxling, and then again, out of Loxling’s sight. The overjoyed whoop of pleasure from Saint-14, followed by an intensely drawn out, deep moan made it obvious just what it was that the two of them were about to get up to.

Crankily, Geppetto floated back into the living room, where Loxling was still hovering.

“He’s talked about this for centuries, we’re not going to hear anything but that from them for a long time.”

Loxling did a backflip and then snuggled up to Geppetto.

“I _know_ , isn’t it great?!”


End file.
